Use Caution When Scanning, Emailing or Faxing Documents - 11/8/11

With many areas of the University transitioning to the use of multifunction copy, print, scan, and fax machines, the University’s Data Stewards organization reminds users to protect sensitive data in all documents they are scanning. Information that wouldn’t be sent in an email should not be scanned or sent from any machine, whether to a personal email address or others.

These multifunction machines have a hard drive where they store an image of every document scanned, copied or emailed. When individuals scan a document and send it to their email addresses, it is stored in the multifunction machine and is also saved in the Exchange server for a certain period of time, even when the receiver has deleted it. Moreover, the entire process happens without any kind of encryption involved. The University Data Handling Requirements specify that all electronic communications containing restricted data must be encrypted.

More information about handling electronically transmitted information may be found on the Data Stewards Web page.

The Data Stewards organization spans multiple business units across the University and is responsible for creating Purdue’s data handling requirements, which apply to how Purdue handles and uses all the data entrusted to it. Data stewards also participate with administrative and technical staff members on projects that create, maintain, and use University data, whether on paper or electronic form.